The only issue with swapping your motherboard is that your copy of Windows won't work, as it's licensed to the motherboard of the original computer. So you can't re-activate it on the new motherboard. Other than that, it looks fine.

Turbo is a mode where if the processor determines it has a light load, it turns off one or more cores and increases the clock speed on the others.

You can't with OEM keys, as they're tied to the motherboard. Especially with keys from Dell, HP, etc. They're usually such that you can't use them on anything else other than the computer it came with.

OK, well Windows aside, would this be an upgrade or not? I can't find any benchmarks comparing the two so I need some advice on whether I should do it or not.

It would be an upgrade although it may not be much depending on what you're doing with it. The closest comparison I found was here with an Athlon II x4 645 vs an A8 5600K. Your board however does support Phenom II processors and something like a Phenom II would be a nice upgrade although you'd have to stick to ones with a TDP of 95W or less but you would be able to continue to use the same Windows license.

Essentially the reason that it would be an upgrade is because the Trinity APU has more cache available and the CPU cores are a bit more efficient than your previous gen Athlon CPU. I'm curious, just how good of a deal are you getting on this APU & motherboard? Actually looking again it wouldn't be an upgrade, I thought you were looking at a quad core trinity for some reason but that's a dual core part. It might perform the same in some games but it's not going to be an upgrade.

I'm on the fence if it's an upgrade or not. CPU performance wise? Per core it would definitely be better. But benchmarks I've seen don't seem to make it worthwhile to go for a full system makeover.

If you're looking for gaming performance OP, a graphics card with the money you were willing to spend would probably give you more performance than the bottom tier APU and a new motherboard. You also don't have to worry about Windows.

Essentially the reason that it would be an upgrade is because the Trinity APU has more cache available and the CPU cores are a bit more efficient than your previous gen Athlon CPU. I'm curious, just how good of a deal are you getting on this APU & motherboard? Actually looking again it wouldn't be an upgrade, I thought you were looking at a quad core trinity for some reason but that's a dual core part. It might perform the same in some games but it's not going to be an upgrade.

sorry for double post*

You mention the cache is better on the APU, but at this link it shows mine being higher:

While generally higher amounts of cache do attribute to performance improvements, this is really architecture dependent. For instance, a Pentium 4 is crippled unless you give it lots of cache because of the way it was designed. Its competitor, the Athlon XP, was more efficient at handling processing so adding more cache didn't do anything to help it much. Athlon XP's had half the amount of cache as the Pentium 4, but they were often neck and neck in performance (if not the Athlon being better).

So more cache does not automatically mean improved performance between architectures.

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 5 guests

You cannot post new topics in this forumYou cannot reply to topics in this forumYou cannot edit your posts in this forumYou cannot delete your posts in this forumYou cannot post attachments in this forum